


Clever Wives

by ariel2me



Series: Inspired by Fire & Blood [9]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire & Related Fandoms, A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-17
Updated: 2019-03-17
Packaged: 2019-11-18 20:01:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,314
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18125831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ariel2me/pseuds/ariel2me
Summary: Lord Redwyne was incredulous. “The Tyrells are dolts,” he said. “I am sorry, Your Grace, they are my liege lords, but … the Tyrells are dolts, and Lord Bertrand was a sot as well.” (Fire & Blood)The Tyrells were dolts, it was sometimes alleged, but they had a knack for marrying clever wives.





	Clever Wives

**Author's Note:**

> A prequel to[  **The Company of Clever Women**](https://archiveofourown.org/works/17205047)

The Tyrells were dolts, it was sometimes alleged (most loudly by their own bannermen), but they had a knack for marrying clever wives. Martyn’s father Lord Bertrand had been wed to the redoubtable Lady Selena of House Hightower, whose talent for tact and diplomacy (or aptitude for guile and cunning, according to her detractors) had kept Highgarden safe during one of the most perilous times in the realm’s history. The Tyrells had taken no part in the conflict between King Maegor and his nephews, until they finally declared their support for Prince Jaehaerys at a time when the prince’s victory was almost certain, yet they somehow managed to avoid incurring the wrath of either side throughout their long period of refusing to choose a side and staying resolutely on the fence.   

While his formidable lady wife still lived, Lord Bertrand was content to leave Highgarden in her care (and under her control, though he was far too proud to admit  _this_ particular fact) as he indulged his passion for horses, wine, women and songs. After Lady Selena’s sudden and unexpected demise from a cold that had settled in her chest, Lord Bertrand, in a fit of remorse, vowed to take more interest in the running of his castle and his lands. Among the many unwise decisions he made at this time, one of the most disastrous was the appointment of his favorite cousin as the seneschal of Highgarden. It did not take too many years before the combined effect of this seneschal’s dire ineptitude and Lord Bertrand’s very expensive taste (now given free rein, unfortunately, without the firm hand of Lady Selena to restrain it) began to threaten the famed wealth and bounty of Highgarden.

Martyn Tyrell was more his mother’s son than his father’s, and he was neither a dolt nor a drunkard, but he had grown up at a time when the riches of Highgarden were safe and secure. How to reverse Highgarden’s reversal of fortune was a task beyond Martyn’s talent and ability (which were not so meager, though they did not lie in the realm of numbers and accounts).

Florence Fossoway was born into a House where the absence of wealth was a painful reminder of a more glorious past, courtesy of an ancestor with an expensive taste for wanderlust. This ancestor had traveled far and wide in the Free Cities and beyond, but unlike those who roamed the world and brought home untold riches and treasures, he only managed to  _spend_ ,  _spend_  and  _spend_ , to the great detriment of his immediate family, and later, his descendants. By the time Florence’s father Lord Fostyn became the Lord of Cider Hall, very little was left of House Fossoway’s former prosperity.

Florence had shown an aptitude for numbers from a very young age. She knew how to add, subtract, divide and multiply before she knew how to read, according to her lady mother, though her lord father was fond of boasting that Florence had been counting apples since the day she took her first step. Not long after Lady Flora taught her daughter the basic principles of keeping the castle’s accounts (using red apples to signify expenses and green apples to signify incomes, a method of instruction she deemed more fruitful for teaching children than the quill-and-parchment method preferred by Cider Hall’s maester), Florence came up with a long list of ingenious (and highly effective) ways to decrease Cider Hall’s expenses.

Her most famous and significant accomplishment at Cider Hall would come later: her successfully-implemented plan to overhaul and transform the way Cider Hall’s fearsomely strong cider was produced, stored and distributed, which greatly increased the income of House Fossoway and finally allowed them to pay off their debt.

“If you are not in possession of a particular talent or skill that you deem important to rule Highgarden and the Reach, then you must marry it,” Lady Selena had bluntly told her son. “You must wed a woman in possession of that skill or talent. What the Lord of Highgarden could not do, the Lady of Highgarden must be able to do as his surrogate. What the Lord of Highgarden could not be, the Lady of Highgarden must be able to be in his place. Choose your lady wife wisely, and many things will fall in place.”

The fame of Florence Fossoway had reached Highgarden, and Martyn Tyrell could not think of a more fitting woman to become his lady wife and the mistress of Highgarden during this time of great crisis for House Tyrell. Any objection Lord Bertrand might have had to the match (after all, the Fossoways were not as exalted in power, wealth and lineage as the Hightowers and several other Tyrell’s bannermen, and Lord Bertrand considered it his gods-given right and prerogative as a father to choose Martyn’s bride) was reluctantly set aside after Martyn confided that the marriage was “my dear mother’s dying wish, whispered in my ear while you were absent from her bedchamber, Father.”

His mother would not have faulted him for the lie, Martyn truly believed.  _You would have chosen Lady Florence too, Mother, had you lived to see what she has accomplished for Cider Hall, and what she no doubt could accomplish for Highgarden. Together, we could keep Highgarden and the Reach safe and prosperous, I do not doubt._

Lord Fossoway, naturally, welcomed the proposal with wide open arms. The Tyrells were his liege lords, and his daughter would be the first Fossoway honored with such a match. “It is a great honor and an even greater opportunity for you, Florence, and for our long-beleaguered House,” he told his daughter.  

And what of Florence Fossoway herself? How did she feel about being chosen with the expectation that she could reverse the reversal of Highgarden’s fortune? 

She  _relished_  the challenge. She was eager and raring to go. Highgarden was a larger, more intricate and complicated problem for her to solve, for her to apply her skill and talent, to  _test_  her skill and talent. Florence had ambitions, yes, ambitions and a great drive to achieve that went beyond Cider Hall; she was not ashamed to admit this, at least to herself, and to her mother and father, if not to the world at large. Her future husband had promised that her hands would not be frustratingly tied by a higher power, since her future good-father, the _current_  Lord of Highgarden, was too cowed by the terrifying prospect of debt and insolvency to be a great impediment to her plans and schemes to save Highgarden, according to Martyn.

There was also the indisputable state of affair that for highborn ladies of the Reach who did not lack brothers (and consequently would not be ruling any lands in their own right), the position of the (consort, not ruling) Lady of Highgarden was the highest pinnacle to which they could aspire, the one that would provide them with the best chance for exerting the most influence in the region.  

That settled the question of Highgarden, but how did Florence feel about marrying Martyn  _the man,_ not the heir and future lord of Highgarden?

She wished she could feel just as eager. He seemed like a pleasant enough young man, famed for his unfailing chivalry and courtesy. Everything she had seen and heard about him indicated a virtuous man with none of his father’s various excesses and failings. And yet …

 _Love will come later_ , her mother said, while brushing Florence’s hair for the last time as a maiden.  _You must build it, together, stone by stone, like building a castle in your heart._

 _Or apple by apple,_ Florence said, to tease out a smile on her mother’s face, and to silence the momentary doubt and reservation in her own heart.  

 _We will make Highgarden safe and prosperous again, account by account_ , she would later say to her husband.


End file.
